Forum:Aspect pairings
Moved from Talk:Aspect#Sorting of Aspects ---- I simply feel that it isn't right to sort the aspects after a specific common headcanon in regards to the order and relations of aspects. I have seen this particular headcanon put forth by many blogs on Tumblr, such as bladekindeyewear and oppositestuck, both of which are quite popular and thus have massive influence; to save space I will refrain from referring to any more sources than just the two. There are several more headcanons than just this list of aspects, and I need to clarify something. I just went through all dialogue in the comic again. There is no point at which it relates Life and Doom together. If anything, Doom seems to be more focused on fate, pessimism, and unfortunate circumstances than death itself. Same goes for Void and Light. So those are merely speculatory. The only hard evidence there is for any of the pairings is that of Time and Space, for obvious reasons. Even recently there's been evidence for some relation between Life and Void with the two rings becoming prevelent, but that's beside the point. This isn't about headcanons. This is about keeping the speculation and headcanons out of the article itself. The list provided by the Homestuck team at this point is the most unbiased as it has nothing to do with headcanons at all, and that's why I feel that order should be used instead. Wingetom2 (talk) 05:02, November 15, 2014 (UTC) :At of the 12 aspects, 6 of them are canonically paired. While you might have missed dialogue or things characters have said this does not make them head canons. :* Space and Time - Two fundamental aspects as , various other insinuations, and real life. Really no dispute. :* Life and Doom - :* Light and Void - This is a bit more complicated as 1) it is spread throughout the story, and 2) we are never given a clear interpretation of Light where it is not being impacted by the character's class. Anyhow, as covering " " and " ", when Calliope invites Roxy into her dream bubble she points out that as a hero of Void it will help to keep it hidden. Meanwhile when Rose enters the bubble Calliope immediately reacts to the fact that a hero of Light will do the exact opposite and serve to expose the bubble. Aradia also identifies Light as meaning "fortune" in a context which does not match up with the Serket's use of Light as luck, but rather more fate, relevance, and meaning. :The only pairs which are headcanons are Mind/Heart, Rage/Hope, and Breath/Blood. :The list you are going off isn't even a list, and while it is an official image there is no indication that it is supposed to represent any proper order and in fact contradicts the Light/Void and Life/Doom pairings, which would seem to dismiss it as a source. - The Light6 (talk) 05:34, November 15, 2014 (UTC) ::I never disputed the pairing of Space and Time, but I think you're misinterpreting what Calliope meant when she said " " Technically many classpects of varying class and aspect can share at least some power in common. It makes more sense, considering that , , and that Mituna wanred his team . Though these abilities might be tied into their blood color powers, it's unlikely considering their abilities are related but not the same (differing by their class but not by blood or aspect). ::As for the comparison of knowledge to Void, Void as an aspect is completely about " ", exactly as you said it. This however is a tricky concept. Void can obfuscate knowledge and truth (thus making secrets and lies), but knowledge is overarching over both the aspects of Light and Mind. However, as we have seen , Light is more of the "enlightenment" and "awareness" end of the concept of knowledge, rather than the actual possession of information, which is the kind of knowledge Calliope used in her description of it, but that doesn't mean it's related to Mind, but rather that Void itself is all about lacking. Lacking mass, knowledge, size, personality, etc. Light on the other hand is completely unrelated. ::And as for the list I referenced on Whatpumpkin, just look at any page selling aspect related merchandise. It's all in a specific order. This however seems no longer to be of importance as now we seem to be debating more of what is and is not canon. - Wingetom2 (talk) 06:14, November 15, 2014 (UTC) :::You'll have to forgive my imminent pitfall of text, because with all the canonical sources having already been stated, I'm forced to use more abstract logic to defend this. :::The WhatPumpkin order is probably intentional and has a partial organization to it, but that's a result of one simple fact: initially Hussie only had four aspects: Light, Breath, Time, and Space. The other 8 literally weren't even conceptualized by him at the time. Time and Space as "cosmic elements", and Breath and Light as the elements of life in Western religion, e.g. Christianity. When he decided he was going to introduce 12 more characters to finish off the coincidental protein base pattern the kids had going in their screennames (characters he gave zodiac signs to specifically because there were 12 of them), he needed 8 more aspects. :::It is not unreasonable to venture that at this time, he may have considered rearranging the pairs to form a more concrete system. Breath and Light are all well and good as homage to Western religion, but when you've expanded your system to essentially cover "most facets of reality", they don't exactly work as a balanced dichotomy. Space and Time do: they're literally space and time, plus physical and abstract reality, among other things. The key to this is related yet opposing concepts, such as yin and yang. And let it be noted I struggled there to think of such a concept that didn't have aspect-connected connotations. :::So really, it's a matter of the store being in order of which products came first. Why wouldn't he just rearrange it? Beats me, honestly, and use that to your case if you want. But let's examine this... Light/knowledge/luck isn't exactly related to air/drive/whatever Breath represents at all. I'd have trouble putting them on a scale together. If I were Hussie, and I had given myself an opportunity to rearrange the pairs by introducing new elements, my immediate thought for the opposite of light would be, obviously, darkness. In other words, Void. It even fits a classical elements theme if you want to fit that in here, Light would obviously be fire and Void has a lot of connections to water, the symbol's practically a blue whirlpool. :::Honestly, I have almost no idea what your point was with the Captor examples. Calliope saying two things are "as opposite as can be" is pretty clear -- they're as opposite as can be. And to be polar opposites, really, things need to be judged on the same scale. Regarding what you said about death and Doom, do you really think there's another aspect that fits the concept of death better? One that isn't already taken. Because if we're all nodding in agreement that Time/Space is so obvious as to be indisputable, thus canceling the possibility of Space/Void despite the obvious connections, then surely we can also agree "darkness and light" is a pretty solid theme, thus leaving Life to be paired with either Hope, Mind, Heart, Rage, Doom, Blood, or Breath. The opposite should be obvious. :::Also, Mind demonstratably deals far more with choices and free will than it does with information or knowledge. :::If we're going to continue this, it should be moved to a forum. 09:47, November 15, 2014 (UTC) ::::Okay, this debate is going on quite longer than I expected it to, but before I move this to a MSPAForum topic, which may be either today or tomorrow, I would just like to point a few things out in relation to what you said. ::::A) You quite probably just stated the relation between Breath and Light in that they are elements of life together, and not meaning the aspect "Life" itself. :::::This would actually make sense, as they represent the different parts of nature around us. Plus, Breath has proven to be more than just air and the wind. Breath has been shown to represent flow, change, and freedom as well; air seems to be only an overarching elemental theme to it rather than the entire composition. This concept of flow, change, and freedom would compliment but not oppose Light's concepts of luck, fortune, and enlightenment. :::::The Yin and Yang example you used was somewhat incorrect though; the two are meant to compliment, not oppose each other. You used this to claim that Void is obviously darkness, the lack of Light, but once you apply this opposite concept it really doesn't work with any other pairing. Take Time and Space for instance. There's no doubt that this pairing is canon, but the concepts of the opposite do not work with them. If you were to take the concept of time and invert it, you'd get time going in reverse, which is still time. It's not an invertable concept, but rather one complimented by Space. ::::B) You severely misquoted Calliope and then used that misquotation as an argument. :::::She said " ", not "a hero of life and a hero of doom have aspects as opposite as can be". I'm assuming English is your first language (correct me if I'm wrong), so you should very well know the difference between the concepts of "different" and "opposite". For instance, a train and a sandwich are as different as can be. They literally have nothing in common unless you use some complex abstract thought process to connect them. However, a train when defined tool of transportation could be considered the opposite of cargo, the items being transported (again a stretch but opposite is a very complex concept in of itself). ::::C) Yes, I am going to use the WhatPumpkin example again, because Hussie thinks ahead. We've had references upon references to recent events found far back in the comic, so the concept that Hussie made the aspects up as he went is quite ludicrous. Sure, he didn't have the symbols yet, but he had them planned out for a while. ::::Anyway, I'm going to see if I can get a topic on the MSPAForum going. I'll make a note of it here if I do. Wingetom2 (talk) 17:18, November 15, 2014 (UTC) :::::He meant that it should be taken to the wiki forum. (EDIT: Done) :::::Also, I will point out that while you are correct that "opposite" and "different" aren't the same thing, "as different as can be" is pretty strongly implicative of opposition. A sandwich is extremely different from a train, but some hypothetical opposite of a train would be more different than a sandwich is. So the superlative statement "as... as can be" implies opposition, as a merely very dissimilar thing isn't the most different possible. But this is getting into extreme semantics over Calliope's exact phrasing, and while Hussie does jerk us around with exact words quite often, I think there's a line :::::EDIT: Oh, and by the way, :::::This however seems no longer to be of importance :::::Yes, I am going to use the WhatPumpkin example again :::::Make your mind up. Regardless, though, WP's merch list is absolutely not a reliable indicator of anything canonical. Hussie is the owner of the company, but he does not control the day-to-day running of the merch site. It's certainly possible that he stepped in and said "ok these need to stay in this order, because reasons", but why would he do so? He guards his plot secrets well; he's unlikely to go "yeah let's splash it on a wall in full view on this merch list". You need to apply Occam's Razor, and accept that it's most likely just in that order because it was released in that order. :::::And another thing, Hussie does think ahead, but he is also immensely, immensely skilled at retroactive foreshadowing. Just because something is a reference to something that appears much later doesn't always mean he planned the whole thing from the start. He's very good at adjusting something so that things before it become clues when they didn't originally point to the thing specifically :::::ANOTHER EDIT: I think it also bears stating for the record that the article does not outright state any aspect pairings other than Space/Time. For the rest, it only suggests pairings (although it does claim Aranea outright states the opposition of Void to Light, where as far as I can tell she just really really strongly implies it). It makes little difference what order we put the sections in – we've arranged them by suspected pairs, but nowhere does it say on the page "THEY ARE IN THIS ORDER IN PAIRS". So pretty much however this debate pans out, it won't mean much to the article as it stands ::::::About the forum discrepancy, I did not know that. I'm new here and I apologize for my ignorance. ::::::The only reason I brought back up the WhatPumpkin topic is because it was referenced again and it did make for a good argument (or so I thought) at the time. How this all began is really petty to be honest. All I did was rearrange the order of the aspects listed on the page and suddenly it became about headcanons. Do I headcanon it differently than the article lists the aspects? Yes, but I was just trying to find a neutral solution. Much good that did. ::::::Moving on, strong implication is still not canon but just speculation. I've read through these sections time and again and I never thought that it was a "strong implication" at all. I'm not certain how you conceptualize opposites, but it has nothing to do with a degree of difference, if that can even be measured. As far as I'm aware, "as different as can be" implies no relation whatsoever, meaning that the two share nothing in common. Additionally, I made a point about how it never was stated that they strictly have to be opposites, as I used the comparison with Time and Space. Time and Space are related but not opposing forces of reality. While -(Light) = Void, -Time = Time. Inversion doesn't work for every aspect, which is why I have always seen at as more of a complimenting process, like complimentary colors on a wheel. --Wingetom2 (talk) 21:40, November 15, 2014 (UTC) Well.... here. If you're making a system of things that represent all of reality, like I tried to word it before, it kinda has to be a compromise between opposites and related elements. When you talk about your justification for Breath and Light, or a better example, how some people pair Breath and Life, that's like putting fire and lava together in a dichotomy as classical elements, instead of fire and water. There's no point in pairing things that are so similar they basically overlap. They have to be opposite while addressing the same topic, like darkness and light, or time and space, not like Life and Breath, or Life and Blood, or Light and Mind. On the topic of Space and Time. They aren't opposites, you're right. Not in their direct sense. Negative Space would be Void, and negative Time would.... probably, at least, be reverse time travel? But here's the thing. Just like Time kind of embodies a backwards travel in its own medium, Space embodies not only "things that exist", but also outer space, interestingly also covering stars, celestial bodies, and the lack of matter in between. It's helpful to think of Space in that sense, as an extension of its definition, but not for the core of the aspect, what defines it within the pair. For me, and I realized this recently, Time is abstraction and Space is physical reality. Those can easily be called opposites, things that physically exist and mentally or conceptually exist, and they fit very well to the aspects. I really wish I could find where Hussie said that he made Breath and Light first, because I know he did, I remember him saying he only needed to make the other aspects when the trolls came about, but it does me no good when I can't remember where it was. As for the whole purpose of this drawn out debate... Yes, on a very real level we're debating headcanons. You can rearrange Breath, Blood, Heart, Mind, Rage, Hope, Doom, Life, any way you want really. But this isn't just about headcanons, it's also about you ignoring practically direct confirmations on the behalf of a few characters that certain aspects are indeed opposites/paired. Put yourself in Calliope's position, for instance. If you were describing some other system, say, socioeconomic class structure, and wanted to describe how through certain life paths they could end up in similar conclusions, would you use for example "lower and middle class people are as different as can be", or "lower and upper class people are as different as can be"? I don't know about you, but I'd use the two classes that I would consider at the most extreme opposite ends of the scale to make my point. (and this also exemplifies how most people treat "opposites" as things that are at two extremes of the same scale) 23:49, November 17, 2014 (UTC) :Also, there's the matter of our reliable source. I didn't post this earlier because I wanted to check with SoftOwl before posting her words on the matter, but in a drawn out discussion on reddit, SoftOwl, who basically runs WhatPumpkin and Paradox Space and the MSPA forums, voiced her agreement and support on the pairings of Time/Space, Void/Light, Mind/Heart, Rage/Hope, Doom/Life, and Blood/Breath. So I think that settles that? 20:10, November 18, 2014 (UTC) ::Ah yes, I was planning to post that originally to point out that the claim that the image was a "list provided by the Homestuck team" wasn't really true since it contradicts fairly recent statements of high level What Pumpkin team members. But I couldn't remember where Rachel's comments were so I left it out because I couldn't verify her exact wording. So thanks for that. ::Really this boils down to a few things 1) Is the order presented on What Pumpkin indicative of anything? And 2) If it cannot be shown to be indicative of anything representing an official order, is there a problem with how we've ordered them? ::For #1 there is no real evidence that that the What Pumpkin order is meant to be anything official, especially since it contradicts certain things. And even then, saying it is supposed to be official requires us to speculate on the intent of What Pumpkin team members who may or may not have been told anything but Hussie. ::For #2 our order as Sorceror Nobody, there is nothing on the page indicating that the order presented is supposed to be indicative. Sure the order was deliberate but would placing the aspects in a randomly generated order actually be any better? Because technically any order we put them in could be construed to be indicative. As for out deliberate order? Half of the pairs have canonical backing and all of them have backing of a What Pumpkin team member in express contradiction to an old What Pumpkin image. ::Ultimately the order is not only fine, but also probably the best we can do with our limited information. Unless new canonical information arises there is really no need to meddle with them, well except to pair order positioning and such, but there is even more subjective and itself, unless we wanted to do things like used release/introduction order to take it out of our hands in which case we could switch things like Light and Void around so that Light is before Void. However like I said; I think barring new information it should be left as is, unless there is consensus to modify the order in some way because otherwise it simply results in edit wars. Which is what lead to this current discussion in the first place where the current majority opinion has been reiterated as "the current order is fine". - The Light6 (talk) 01:07, November 19, 2014 (UTC) :::I still remain unswayed in my opinion, but that's okay. This place is a joint community run by the majority opinion, and since that has been stated out of favor of the manner in which I reorganized the page, who am I to argue with the decision? I'd be a fool to butt my head against a futile topic like that. I am terribly sorry for initially being so stubborn about the editing of the page, but it was quite interesting to hear the opinions of the mods of this site. :::From here on forth I will strive to be constructive, and not deconstructive, in my edits and contributions. --Wingetom2 (talk) 06:42, November 19, 2014 (UTC)